,
beckoning her to him, sorry for his harshness. Lorraine went to him
and knelt beside him, slipping an arm around his neck while she hid her
face on his shoulder.

"I won't be a nuisance, dad--really, I won't," she said. "I--I can
shoot a gun. I never shot one with bullets in, but I could. And I
learned to do lots of things when I was working in that play West I
thought was real. It isn't like I thought. There's no picture stuff
in the real West, I guess; they don't do things that way. But--what I
want you to know is that if they're fighting you they'll have to fight
me, too.

"I don't mean movie stuff, honestly I don't. I'm in this thing now,
and you'll have to count me, same as you count Jim and Sorry. Won't
you please feel that I'm one more in the game, dad, and not just
another responsibility? I'll herd cattle, or do whatever there is to
do. And I'll keep my mouth shut, too. I can't stay here, day after
day, doing nothing but sweep and dust two rooms and fry potatoes and
bacon for you at night. Dad, I'll go _crazy_ if you don't let me into
your life!

"Dad, if you knew the stunts I've done in the last three years! It was
make-believe West, but I learned things just the same." She kissed him
on the unshaven cheek nearest her--and thought of the kisses she had
breathed upon the cheeks of story fathers with due care for the make-up
on her lips. Just because this was real, she kissed him again with the
frank vigour of a child.

"Dad," she said wheedlingly, "I think you might scare up something that
I can really ride. Yellowjacket is safe, but--but you have real live
horses on the ranch, haven't you? You must not go judging me by the
palms and the bay windows of the Casa Grande. That's where I've slept,
the last few years when I wasn't off on location--but it's just as
sensible to think I don't know anything else, as it would be for me to
think you can't do anything but skim milk and fry bacon and make
sour-dough bread, just because I've seen you do it!"

Brit laughed and patted her awkwardly on the back. "If you was a boy,
I'd set you up as a lawyer," he said with an attempt at playfulness.
"I kinda thought you could ride. I seen how you piled onto old
Yellowjacket and the way you held your reins. It runs in the blood, I
guess. I'll see what I can do in the way of a horse. Ole Yellowjacket
used to be a real rim-rider, but he's gitting old; gitting old--same as
me."

"You're not! You're